Note 59 — Chapter I · : THE PHYSIOCRATS

Pp. 835, 839. And Mercier de la Rivière writes in terms not less severe; “He is responsible under pain of annihilation for the products of society, and no part of the produce which goes to support the cultivator should wittingly be employed otherwise.” The history of Ireland is an interesting commentary on these words.

But let us always remember that when the Physiocrats speak of the rights of the cultivator they think only of the farmer and métayer and never of the paid agriculturist. They are content to demand merely a decent existence for the latter. Were they put too much at ease they would perhaps leave off working. See Weulersse, vol. ii, p. 729. He seems a little unjust, and quotes some words of Quesnay, who protests against the belief that “the poor must be kept poor if they are not to become indolent.”